Modders to team-up? How?

Discussion in 'Modding' started by Navigator, Feb 26, 2017.

  1. peterchen

    peterchen Registered

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    More is always better! :D
     
  2. Navigator

    Navigator Registered

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    I would volunteer for that.
    Soaking up info and spreading it around is my day job :)

    The main problem is; getting al the info.
     
    Last edited: Mar 26, 2018
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  3. smbrm

    smbrm Registered

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    Yes, one has to know something before one can report on it! I have started investigating blender to learn 3D modelling. But I am sure there is more to getting, just the 3D car model part into Rfactor2, than just being able to draw a model? But you have to start somewhere.
     
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  4. Navigator

    Navigator Registered

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    Indeed. In this case, I think there will be more people needed; one for every craft. And don't forget about the track guys.
     
  5. T1specialist

    T1specialist Registered

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    I think there are couple of key issues if the community starts writing guides. First is that because the writer has probably learned his own information from someone else or through sheer experimentation the information could be just wrong. It could be that the solution works as presented but it is not a good way to solve the issue.

    For example I could go and write a guide how to create collider mesh for rf2. But I'm pretty sure half of the info in that guide would be wrong because in reality I have no idea what kind of parameters rf2 car collider needs. I have just something that works. Or low enough skill level that I don't know if it doesn't work. I have a lot more questions about colliders than I have answers. So I don't think that a person that barely knows how to get something that kinda works should be writing any guides. But then you have this other person making his first mod and one day he wants to create a collider in rf2 and there is not one single bit of information about it in the internet.. even a basic guide with half wrong info might be useful for him...

    This can then lead to situation where the handful rf2 masters are expected to write guides about everything because they are the only who really know how stuff works. But are they interested in writing guides? I doubt it. I can also imagine it being very unthankful job. First of all not all people who are looking for the information find the guides because it is likely buried on the forums somewhere linking to file hosting site that is dead. So it is kinda poor way to share information. Other one is that you may get small number of people who read your guide and then start posting questions to you via private messages. Can you make me one x? How did you do y? Will you model me a full grid from lemans if I pay you 50 cents?

    Also other issue is that when people write guides they tend to focus on the tools they themselves use. This can lead to situation where one guide is made for 3dsmax plugin, other is for maya+gjed and other one uses blender and 3dsimed. None of that is helpful for beginner who don't yet have the know-how to translate all that information for his own tool.

    I don't think guides is a massive task though. I think it is rf2 devs jobs. Some of the guides already exists and just need a rewrite. A lot of stuff needs to be added of course. My personal opinion is that all guides should focus for the "fbx export for gjed" route but 397 might have different ideas. People might have different ideas. Ac for example focuses mainly on giving general info that is really aimed for new 3dsmax but is easily understandable for people using all different 3d programs and very little 3dsmax specific stuff is ever mentioned. If you search the internet for "pipeline 3DArtists pdf assetto corsa" you will find at least one of the pipeline pdfs which explain all the stuff that rf2 is missing. From that and the later "2016ACPipelinefor3DArtists.pdf" you can get a lot of info which really helps you for the next step which is the sdk. Basically gjed. After that pdf you then have two short videos to watch:

    and


    The pdfs are very well written imho and I don't think those videos really took that much time to make. Considering how important they are their cost-benefit ratio is immense. But they still show enough to get you going.

    I'm not saying rf2 should just copy ac but the way ac has laid out their documentation with fully open examples, detailedly explained individual parts and explaining the whole pipeline from vertex to drivable car and packaging it with the game I think they have set the baseline example how a modding platform supports its content creators with information and tools. I think their pdfs especially are excellent. The fact alone that you don't need to spend hours digging information with google is alone worth ten times the cost of the base game.

    And the results really speak for themselves. It has clearly been worth it for them to write those guides. For rf2 is obviously going to be longer guide with more text because rf2 is a lot more complex and there are more steps and options that need to be right but I think a pipeline guide for rf2 cars and tracks (2 guides) is absolutely essential. Along with a video or pdf about how to create a folder structure and another about how gjed works. I mean a 10 minute video for gjed alone would be super useful. Then the community can take it from there. And it is not that there aren't already some useful guides for rf2 in youtube. They are just hard to find and extremely specifc and don't really help newcomers. I understand that dx11 is a priority along with the graphical work that goes with it but after dx11 I'd really really hope to see guides for rf2 that really allow the community to elevate rf2. The community can't do it alone.
     
  6. D.Painter

    D.Painter Registered

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    Just one thing T1 has said above.
    The info being lost on the forums being buried. Yes, we've seen this happen all the time and it's a pain for sure.
    But the rF2 wiki is the place to put it.
    I've had question that I've asked here and on most occasions I was pointed to it. So people are using it. It wouldn't be a wast of time to update that and link to it in the Dev forum. Is now. The info want get lost then.

    These guide need to be rF2 specific. Not how to use 3D Max to build a car or track objects. Photoshop and so on. These are skill sets that people need to learn but it's not up to the rF2 community to help in this area. Though question can be asked through the forums. I'm sure people are willing to help. There is a multitude of guides out there on that side.
     
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  7. Miro

    Miro Registered

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    Quallity stuff, I am glad I/ we did not start yet. All the time waisted because as you say would not be able to get anyhing together.
    Obviosly those awesome oneclick producing sensations simracing tools have resulted in a gazzilion quallity mods and only a had full of shajtboxes. BC when stuff gets easier people tend to put more effort down, right?
     
    Last edited: Mar 1, 2017
  8. cyruscloud

    cyruscloud Registered

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    I haven't been around much lately and I just scanned through all the post in this topic. This reminds me of something I've had on my mind lately that I would like to get involved in and could help some; I'm suppose to be getting added into Studio 397's beta forums and it is something among many things I want to bring up more with them as they push to reignite RF2. Basically I had an idea for an MA program or Modders Assistance program where some experienced developers assist mod project to help develop them further and make them into more quality content. When I say assist I mean answering questions, walking through, some example work and some assisted work. Studio 397's staff as mentioned before much like with ISI have their own workflow they have to deal with so it isn't likely they are going to be able to offer much and work on their own time tables. They are doing their best to add some quality content but it really has been a struggle for RF2 lately compared to it's competitors, these things take time. Modders want to mod but as mentioned most are uninformed and can only get part way before they call job done because they don't understand how to go further. A lot of additional content can come out of the modders with some help.

    I personally have want to jump in from the track side of things, getting quality RF1 track to look and work good in RF2 isn't actually that hard it just takes a bit of time and understanding how to work the options you have. Building new tracks is a bit harder but definitely explainable, I've actually been discussing with someone for a a year or more now helping them through learning track development. It would be great if experienced individuals from other sides of content for RF2 could get in on doing the same in their fields. Then those of us doing so could act a bit as mediators and talk to each other to help connect people together to get full mods together. While I wish it could be something officially supported by Studio 397 it can work off of the community as well. I try to work professionally but it is a struggle and I have my own projects I'm working on but they take a lot of time and I am grateful to the people supporting me. However something that people really respond to is things that actually end up in their hands and while my long term projects are likely to be far and few between if I can help others achieve the results they want and learn then I'm sure there are some people who might contribute to me for using my time and effort to help others as a whole. Perhaps this could work out for others who want to do the same for physics, sounds, car modeling, etc.

    I know it sounds a bit like a pipe dream; but it could work. I mean a hands on approach to helping is bound to work out better for many than a wall of text in a guide or a question answered here or there on a forum. Obviously there would be some bumps trying to get it to work but could be worth a shot at least.

    If you made it through reading that wall of text, congrats and have a cookie.
     
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  9. wgeuze

    wgeuze Registered

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    Wait a second here. The guy raises some insightful points, you only have to look at some community cars and tracks to be able to agree with him. Yet you are too busy being butthurt to see it.

    The danger of wrong or disinformation is a real one, and I'd accept all the help studio397 can, might, or will offer in whatever form at any time.

    On the flipside, with your snarky sarcastic last comment, you've hit a nail on the head. People are notoriously lazy. You can create 1000 pages of guides, videos on the rF2 side. In the end, people will ask you to explain how 3dsMax works... Or, insist on sticking with 10 year old conversions of conversions, converted by people who didn't have a clue in the first place, 10 years ago.
     
  10. Miro

    Miro Registered

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    Ýou make your points, I make my brake here. Almost a print of the last try.
     
  11. T1specialist

    T1specialist Registered

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    I think the ease of use leading to crap quality is a bit dangerous fallacy. Even with gpl people tend to think it is super difficult to mod. But gpl had tons and tons of addon tracks and many cars and car sets. How could that be if gpl was difficult to mod? I've never released anything for gpl but I think over the years gpl has had at least 3 to 5 track editors released for it in various forms. I remember using at least 2 different ones. Even rf1 had bobstrackbuilder. Sportscar gt had some tool for it too. Sure using those tools you will not be able to achieve the quality of something created in 3d software by a professional but you can still get very close.

    The best part of simple tools is that they make the barrier of entry smaller. Often times those who start with those simple tools end up learning the more difficult ones. It is much harder to jump directly into 3dsmax or blender and make good quality stuff. In a lot of cases that person would make better stuff with bobstrackbuilder for example simply because btb does a lot of stuff for you. Of course btb has much lower ceiling for final quality because the user is fully limited by the feature set of btb and btb can not do all things you want. It is great piece of software but it is not blender or 3dsmax which is both a strength and a weakness.

    And even for btb there are lots of tutorials available. There are tons and tons and tons of tutorials for 3dsmax and blender. Hasn't certainly hurt the quality of the projects that are done with those tools... I think it is a completely insane to think that providing information hurts the quality. I think it is just insane. If you make modding harder the projects that pull through are done by two kinds of teams. One is a team that has lots of time and vast networks of skilled people to talk to. Other groups are people who simply cut out all the parts for which there is no information about how to do it. Cut out the parts they can not get to work. Just look at the history of rf2 and the times modders have left out stuff because no one knows how it works.

    No matter how simple you make the tools and guides the people still need to put in the work to finish their projects. Conversions will happen regardless of how easy or how puzzle it is. And for rf2 there will be even more conversions coming simply because of how vast the size of the rf1 content library is. But in the end a good set of guides and tools will help the people a lot more who are making content from scratch. Personally I'm not against conversions. Not from rf1, not from ac. But I think the focus should be on scratch made stuff. And it is not like I'm saying we need "a btb" for rf2. Not at all. But clearly gjed could be a lot better doing what it already does just like the documentation could explain more things everybody needs to know.

    Also I personally don't really like the idea that there would be some community helpers who give personal advice to people. My main issue with that is that the information is then only available inside the heads of few people. Not only does this mean that you need to know the right people to get any kind of help but it also adds unnecessary time delays. How long does it take for that person to respond if I ask 5 questions? A day, a week? If that information was written on pdf everybody would have access to it instantly. And how many people are willing to log on the forums to only have tens of private messages waiting each time all asking variations of the same questions over and over? Wouldn't that person want to do some modding himself as well?

    I also think that having that info available to everyone will bring in more modders. Because if you can read the guide before you are committed you can see beforehand how difficult it is going to be. If the guide is good then it motivates people to start their mods. If the guide is difficult or missing tons of info then it demotivates people from starting their project. Bad documentation literally kills projects before they even start.
     
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  12. peterchen

    peterchen Registered

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    Why not a BTB for rF2?
    If I would ever make and release a serious moddable racing-sim, I would also offer a full fletched track-editor!
    THAT would attract people and modders!
     
  13. wgeuze

    wgeuze Registered

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    Wake up peterchen, not going to happen.

    There's btb, a plethora of 3d packages which support fbx.

    If people really want to build cars or tracks they will do so. If at every roadblock they quit or start making excuses as to why they don't build stuff, well, its just not going to happen. Remember when a whole bunch of people specifically wanted blender support? Right, exactly how many tracks lately have been built from scratch using blender? I wonder..
     
  14. DaVeX

    DaVeX Registered

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    We should remember rF2 development history too, if some old modders or new ones moved to another platform isn't just for being lazy...
     
  15. wgeuze

    wgeuze Registered

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    Sure that happened, moving targets and such and trying to keep up constantly, but that wasn't the point of my post.
    Also, remember I was talking soley about tracks in this instance. It is also completely human for people to be like sheep. I've seen people state things as fact which were clearly a bunch of hearsay, they probably hadn't built a track all their lives, but stated factually it was easier for another sim. How the heck would you know, but hey, i've heard it online, it must be true eh? And these are usually the people asking for easy tools! Track editors!
    Wait a second, gJed is a track editor! Oh crap, now we get what we want, hurry, more requests and demands and such before we start to do our end of the bargain!

    The thing is, I wanted to get across, building yet another tool which a few people seem to want, won't help one bit if you ask me. Tools exist, have for years. Even more so, some tools which allowed people on a very low level to 'create' (I really mean to say convert, and 3dSimEd would be that tool) tracks for rF1 gave them a false sense of accomplisment. Anything other than that workflow is deemed too difficult. People hear say that building a track for AC is much easier! Yeah, all and well, until you start actual work. The source is the same, so, what does make it easier? Probably, you've guessed it, documentation?

    Example, my failed Zolder project which I don't intent to finish because of time issues, is ported to AC tomorrow, Panthera/Racer the day after, Automobilista the next, and fuck it, GTR2 there after. It is just some 3d geometry! There is no magic there. It is the building of your material that is which takes the most time. And, bombshell, building a track involves much more work than hastily clicking together a couple of road segments and calling it a track. Assuming this is what Peterchen alludes to when he is talking about a 'full fledged' track editor. How are you going to build grandstands? Pitwalls? Terrain mesh?

    Time to put that ongoing suggestion to rest I say. Want to build the tracks to spec? Do the work people, or, when you don't have the time, just admit that and don't build it. Don't have the skill to do so? Either acquire that skill or don't. There is no tool which is going to give you the knowdledge or skillset required instantly, no use in keeping pulling on a dead horse forever. As T1specialist very correctly alluded to, the simplicity of a tool often says something about the end goals of the product you build with it.

    Unless! You stick to navigator's plan, which seems to involve the community to become a tool. A tool which you can use to gain knowledge, to feed back into that tool with gained experience, making it better for all it's users. If that platform is a team of people spreading (S397 sanctioned) information through topics, videos, q/a sessions, wiki, a team of people helping each other and others, doesn't really matter. But, if you insist on having or building a tool. Go with good and solid information and documentation. Abuse the heck out of that, make that count.
     
    Last edited: Mar 2, 2017
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  16. mschreiner

    mschreiner Registered

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    All Information should be put in a wiki that is easy to find on the Forums and website. Then maybe S397 can update some requests on it here and there and then it becomes more complete until they have time to focus on content for the wiki including some video tutorials.
    Just a thought?
     
  17. wgeuze

    wgeuze Registered

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    Very much so, I'm still loving the way, I have plugged these guys earlier, 3dBuzz did their video tutorials over a decade a go. An instructor, and a narrator, the latter taking on the role of student from time to time, asking the questions the viewer was thought to have. Moderately paced, not overcomplicating things when needed, native speakers, all information at hand for you to soak up.
    Ready to go at any time.

    It is only a question if people actually use these. Not very long ago, a great set of video tutorials were created a in a one or two month period. I really hope all this work isn't lost on those two people who devoted their time in doing so, but I really get the impression, it is, or the community has yet to reap the results of those efforts.
     
  18. Tuttle

    Tuttle Technical Art Director - Env Lead

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    Eh eh….how big is that Déjà vu I have? My point of view it’s more on the “social” side and because of that I don’t think there are solutions in a digital form. I've lost the count of how many times I asked, via forums or via private channels, to produce a list of precise points about what modders would want to know and see, and every single time, really every – single – time, this has ended with no more replies. How many times I've also seen questions about modeling that are totally covered by the Autodesk Help desk. How many times I also have seen questions about basics which are completely covered by documents we released the week after the game launch. How many times I have seen wrong albedo maps popping up here and there, despite it's an aspect covered by the wiki, step by step, and discussed at nauseam. Visual Groups are the ABC of game optimization, covered by millions of tutorials and discussions, and still four tracks on top of five are not using any VG and rendering the entire scene on mirrors…etc etc... I'm not saying there is not room for a better support (probably in the form of merging all best information available, on a single place) but, despite tutorials we wrote, wiki we filled, car physics spreadsheet, technical blog pages, documents we put in the devcorner, tools we produced, question we answered, etc etc, I do keep seeing same questions, same vocal hyperboles… and same mistakes. There are things in life that you repeat yourself for years, like that "we need more tools, more documents, a wiki, tire example etc etc", until that day that they become a myth and that echo goes on forever, bouncing back and forth. Let me say I think this is one of those case. This is also the instant gratification age, the shortcuts era, the wiki generation, where people tends to rush the hell out of everything and then blaming something else, because this attitude does produce mostly rubbish. First quality you need, to start modding, cars or tracks, is a very big passion and desire to learn and improve, from the day you start ‘til the day you will retire. You should ask yourself if you are modding because you like the process… or you can’t wait to close your stuff, just to collect gratifications on a forum. And yes, the process of learning and translating knowledge into game assets, it does require LOT of your (free) time, especially now that the overall expectation has been set on modern standards, which are requiring a much wider know-how than before. You also need to challenge yourself every single day or you’ll get bored very soon. After that it's all about skills and knowledge, and you’ll suck big times for years before starting producing something decent. Sorry, it works like that. :) When I started working with CGI and Visuals, there were just huge books and dusty software manuals. I think I never watched a video tutorial in my entire life...but for some reason these days seems unimaginable. The only thing I miss from old times, it's that today it's very hard to create big modding teams like it was with guys like CTDP, with loads of people working on the same project, approaching very good timeframes and facing big challenges and, more important, closing their projects. Probably more than the 80% of the entire rF1 knowledge you find on the web, is based on thousands of hours of those modder’s hit and miss attempts. Funny is, a good 90% of that 80% is still valid for rF2, but yeah, there’s people still saying those info are not yet available and they’ll sit and wait for us to release better documents. It’s all good. :)
     
  19. lagg

    lagg Registered

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    I agree with you Tuttle, and this is the reason why i said that we need a place to have the good info. I'm referring to 1 place with useful info.
    My opinion is that now this info is in many places and mixed with a lot misinformation and a lot of questions here and there.
    There is a lot of good info, but sometimes is difficult to find it.
     
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  20. Woodee

    Woodee Registered

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